Re: Challenge every Red Light Camera Ticket!

Many years ago I recall hearing that the German approach was to have large numbers of clearly marked police cars -- to deter rather than simply apprehend lawbreakers.

MB

On 09/22/04 08:06 pm 127.0.0.1 put fingers to keyboard and launched the following message into cyberspace:

About 10 years ago when I lived in socal I lived in Hacienda heights and worked in Whittier. Using city streets instead of the freeway there was a short (maybe 2 mile) section of 4 lane road with almost no side streets. traffic would run at 60 or better. The local cops put a patrol car on the shoulder. Sometimes it was manned, but sometimes it had a dummy in it. Needless to say, traffic slowed down to the speed limit (40 or 45) because drivers were never sure if it was a real cop or a dummy.

Maybe this is why I haven't seen a lot of these cameras in Texas: the traffic code there states that if a driver enters an intersection legally, he/she can leave the intersection legally.

Therefore, it doesn't matter if the light turns red while you're in the intersection-- you don't get a ticket so long as the light was yellow when you entered it.

There is no ability to shorten yellows to trap drivers so the profit motive just ain't there.

How do you know?

Other than just you saying so, I mean.

Depends on the redesign.

If you redesign it so that one road passes under or over the other and you eliminate the need for the signal entirely... well, I'd bet that would lower the number of red-light runners to zero.

Sure there is, even so. To give you an extreme example, let's say that there's a 50 MPH speed limit on a road you typically drive. The yellow light at a camera-controlled intersection lasts only 0.5 second. You may see the light turn yellow while you're a few hundred feet away and (logically) assume that it's going to last 4-5 seconds based on the speed of traffic, so you keep your foot in it, as you could probably barely stop before the intersection without locking 'em up as it is, and you will likely have cleared the intersection within 5 seconds if you maintain speed. However, the light turns red before you enter the intersection, and smile! you know the rest.

An extreme example, but the same sort of thing happens all the time with RLC's, just not quite as short yellows.

nate

That would totally eliminate all left turn accidents as well. Round-abouts minimize the severity of the inevitable accidents. They're even starting to now bring them to this continent.

You haven't thought it thru very well. The yellow is there to warn the drivers that it will turn red in a few seconds. If it turns red too qickly, then entering the intersection "legally" (i.e., on the yellow) doesn't apply (because there's this thing called "finite stopping distance").

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my adddress with the letter 'x')

We've started to get them in Metro Detroit.

I don't understand why they're supposed to be all that great. For one thing, it virtually assures that everyone reaching the intersection

*has* to stop. Not so with a traditional intersection, where people who are traveling at the correct speed can sail through green light after green light.

The intersection near my home where they've implemented this is a relatively low-traffic-volume spot. I imagine it would be absolutely miserable in higher-traffic-volume places.

Bridges with ramps just intuitively seem better to me.

--Geoff

Ever been to Boston? They had a few there when I was a kid (60s). We called them rotarys. They have a modified version here in Portland, OR.

If you've got clear vision & they're designed correctly you shouldn't have to shed more than 10% of your speed (seeing as it's a 4 way yield). I've been through Europe where the roundabout is a slightly raised (4" round mound in the middle of an intersection. on off hours I've seen many people drive through at full speed.

The problem with round-abouts (true round-abouts & not these 1/4 round affairs) is that poor drivers don't try to "merge", they stop & wait for a large gap.

"If" roadway etiquette is followed a large number of people can pass through with minimal interruption and greater safety.

(bad drivers can totally screw up round-abouts though. When I was in the UK this past winter 3 drivers were banned from a private tunnel's round-about b/c monitoring determined that those 3 were responsible for nearly 60% of the morning's delay's! this was a tunnel used by thousands).

And yes, Bridges with ramps are "better" unless you're the taxpayer who's got to pay for them or look at them. But with many North American Drivers or newer European drivers (those who've gotten their licenses in the past 5 years) round-abouts are terrors.

One of the news magazine took a look at several of the lights people were complaining about. The yellows were not abnormally short for the speed of the intersection compared with intersections without cameras.

And is that practical?

See, that's exactly the problem. Around here, we have a lot of 'Yield' signs placed where stop signs should be. People who don't ignore the yield signs routinely (same ones who roll through stop signs) are conditioned to stop for them. I am, I must confess. The yield sign doesn't evoke the 'proper' behavior as assumed by the roundabout design.

I submit that waiting for people to start exhibiting the proper behavior will be pretty hopeless.

Around here, proper roadway etiquette means that you resist the urge to give somebody the finger while you cut them off! :-)

All kidding aside, if you don't drive pretty defensively (and somewhat aggressively) you're in for more than your fair share of wreckage around here. I've not owned a single vehicle that hasn't been struck in the rear at least once by somebody else, and believe me, it isn't because I'm not going fast enough!

The roundabout thing is a nice idea, but I sure wouldn't want one at a major intersection, and I'm not convinced that they're a good idea anywhere else, given the conditions on the local roadways. In good weather, they can be difficult at best. When things are covered with ice for the four months or so that can happen here, the roundabout is going to be synonymous with 'traffic jam'.

--Geoff

symptons of a larger problem.

---------- Alex

Plenty of volume in NYC. Redesigning won't stop all red light runners, but it will prevent most of them.

-------------- Alex

If an average driver can figure this out, why can't your local DOT figure it out. On low volume roads they work ok. On a high volume road they just slow down traffic.

------------ Alex

If there is a lot of traffic in the circle, then you have to stop and wait. You can't make room to merge where there is none.

------------- Alex

I grew up with roundabouts in the UK, many of them on major highways. Their diameter was large, and it was possible to traverse them at considerable speed most of the time. They did slow down somewhat in the rush hours but on the whole were pretty good.

Of course there was a difference in the way people drove. There was no "give way to the ...." rule (other than "Give way to traffic already on the roundabout"): drivers approaching an intersection at about the same time mostly followed the "After you, Claude." "No! No! After *you*, Cecil" approach, and everything sorted itself out on the basis of common sense and courtesy. All quite unlike the "Get out of my way, you @#%$&*, before I run you off the road" approach common in many US cities.

Roundabouts of a decent size do take more space than regular light-controlled intersections but are cheaper than over/underpasses.

MB

On 09/24/04 08:24 am Geoff put fingers to keyboard and launched the following message into cyberspace: